


it's automatic

by jeannedarc



Category: VIXX
Genre: Anything is possible, Meet-Cute, Other, did i actually write fluff instead of horrible angst?, fluffy garbage, ot3 cuteness!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-20
Updated: 2016-08-20
Packaged: 2018-08-10 00:03:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7822456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeannedarc/pseuds/jeannedarc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Han Sanghyuk is So, So Fucked.</p>
            </blockquote>





	it's automatic

**Author's Note:**

> title taken from the utada hikaru song, honestly. it doesn't have much to do with the story itself, i just listened to it quite a bit when going over the end of it, and the sound had a lot of the feel of what i was writing. for riley, as always. thanks for being patient with me, and i hope you're happy with my own personal lack of angst while writing!!

Another day of shelving books for no money, Sanghyuk sighs to himself, sliding a copy of Murakami Ryu's In the Miso Soup into its rightful place. Stacked just beside them are books with strange titles -- A Wild Sheep Chase, 1Q84, Sputnik Sweetheart -- with even stranger covers. For a brief moment he wonders who, exactly, gets paid to take the drugs required to come up with some of these things. Sighing again, he pushes his cart stacked thick with books down this aisle, toward the next one, slowly, smacking on a piece of gum, contemplating.

He doesn't know why he'd chosen the library when it came to his mandatory volunteering -- throughout his high school career thus far he'd avoided it at absolutely every possible opportunity -- but it was either that or the local animal shelter, and honestly, he hadn't trusted himself not to snatch up every single dog and take it home with him. His mother would have absolutely killed him. Not to mention the dog food budget would've blown what little spending money he ever had right out of the water.

No, this is the best option for him. And his sanity. And his wallet. And--

Crash.

Shit. He looks up, sees that his paint-peeled, olive-green cart has smacked into...

Ah, there it is. The Reason.

"I'm so sorry," Sanghyuk mumbles, face flushing bright red, though whether it's because of the attractiveness of the boy he's run into or the fact that he seems to have caused said boy physical harm, doesn't really know. All he knows is that he wishes the boy had fallen into his arms instead of into his cart.

"It's fine!" The boy beams, eyes crinkling up into little crescent moons, and suddenly Sanghyuk is completely helpless. "No harm done. I've given myself worse bruises, like, today."

"You're sure?" And sure, he's embarrassed, but more importantly Sanghyuk doesn't really want to get fired from his volunteer position two weeks in for bodily injury of a library patron. "I mean, I-- I can get you some ice, if I banged into you that badly--"

"I mean it," the boy insists, and his smile turns just shy of sly, "I've been banged into worse." He flashes a cheesy wink and starts to turn to go, ending their interaction, but Sanghyuk can't bear the thought.

"Let me get you some ice, at least, so it doesn't swell," he says to the boy's back. "There's a lot of stairs in here, and the elevators aren't working today, and if you get all swollen up you won't be able to get up and down very well, and--"

"Okay!" The boy bounces, actually bounces, back to Sanghyuk and his cart, easily fits his fingers around Sanghyuk's wrist. "Lead the way." A pause. "I'm Jaehwan, by the way. Good to know there's still a gentleman or two out there willing to give first aid."

They go to the break room on the second floor -- little more than a broom closet with a table, three chairs and a refrigerator stuffed inside -- and Sanghyuk makes himself busy shoving ice cubes from the dispenser into a plastic bag. Jaehwan looks around with quiet awe in his eyes. "I never thought there was a place with less noise in this library than a study room," he says.

Of course, the ice cracks loudly as it settles into the bag, ruining the illusion, and Sanghyuk winces at the mild irony of it before sealing the zipper on the bag, wrapping it in paper towels and handing it to Jaehwan. Jaehwan immediately sets the bag down on his clothed hip and hisses relief.

"So do you meet a lot of guys by potentially injuring their junk?" he asks airily, and there's that blush again, rising to Sanghyuk’s cheeks. He mumbles back another apology, and Jaehwan holds up the hand that isn’t pressing the bag to his pelvis. “It’s fine, like I said. I’ve had worse. I’m actually kind of clumsy, if you can believe it? So don’t beat yourself up any more than you already beat me up.” He smiles that smile again, and Sanghyuk’s cheeks grow even hotter at the sight of it. “I have to say, though, I haven’t seen you around here. Are you new?”

“I just started a few days ago,” Sanghyuk replies, taking the chair opposite Jaehwan and sitting cross-legged, hands in his lap, lips pursed slightly in a show of unamusement. “I feel like you know everyone here and you’re interrogating me. Like a second interview, maybe.”

“You’re about half right,” Jaehwan admits, with a quick peal of laughter that absolutely makes Sanghyuk’s heart melt. “I do know everyone here. I come here almost every day. But I’m not interrogating anyone, it’s just interesting to me that it took physical harm for me to meet someone as cute as you.”

Nevermind, Sanghyuk thinks, he does not have A Crush, Jaehwan is not The Reason, because Jaehwan is a cold-blooded killer, out to destroy Sanghyuk’s heart as quickly as possible. And unfortunately, it’s working. “I-I just spend a lot of time in the shelves,” he points out, “doing my job, you know?”

“Yeah, that makes sense.” Jaehwan hums, shifting so that the bag sits differently in his lap. “I don’t come here to read hardly at all, I just need a quiet place to get a little work done from time to time.”

Sanghyuk is about to ask after Jaehwan’s line of work -- not many people who aren’t getting their education tend to show up here just for the atmosphere, anyway -- when he hears his name being called, softly, from around a corner. “I have to go back to work,” he says hastily, “but stay here for a few minutes and I’ll be back, okay?”

Jaehwan just smiles sunnily, nodding. “Whatever you say. I’ll be here.”

Sanghyuk is deeply reprimanded for abandoning his duties, the hawkish woman who calls herself head librarian pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose as she whisper-screams at Sanghyuk that a lot of people want these opportunities, that there aren’t spots for everyone, and that he should consider himself lucky that he has such a good chance to get his hours out of the way. He bites back the urge to roll his eyes the entire way through, ‘yes ma’am’s’ quick to spring to his tongue instead, and when she’s done he slumps, vaguely defeated.

He goes back to the break room, and Jaehwan is gone, a tiny scrap of paper left on the table in his wake. Sanghyuk picks it up, inspects it carefully.

“Thank you for taking care of me! Maybe next time I’ll learn your name! （　´∀｀）  
See you tomorrow, Library Boy!”

Sanghyuk blushes again, carefully tucks the note into his back pocket, and goes back to work, decidedly more distracted than he had been before.

\---

The next day rolls around and Sanghyuk has analysed absolutely every point of conversation they’d made until it makes him sick. He doesn’t mean to do that, but...he really? Wants? To see Jaehwan again. A study room, he’d said. So when Sanghyuk isn’t busy shelving books or directing patrons to the correct section of the stacks or stamping due date cards, he checks the dozens of small nooks in the library, looking for the Official Boy Of His Dreams™.

When he finds Jaehwan, the boy is bent over a white page, sketching out ideas with a well-worn charcoal pencil. Another sits behind his ear, and his mid-length sleeves are pushed up past his elbows, and he has the cutest little smudge of graphite across his cheekbone, and --

Ah, but Sanghyuk hates to stare intentionally, so instead of waiting for the right opportunity to break in, he just does it, peers over Jaehwan’s shoulder. “That looks really good.”

The drawing is just barely coming to life -- a seemingly spunky young heroine, with a giant weapon at her back -- a sword? A hammer? Sanghyuk can’t tell quite yet -- with pigtails held in place by little stars. At the sound of Sanghyuk’s voice, Jaehwan lifts his hand -- stained with ink, Sanghyuk notes, black and blue faded but still stuck in his cuticles and the minute cracks in his fingers -- from his drawing, flips the page to a blank one. Then he turns, quiet, unassuming...until his eyes come to rest on Sanghyuk’s face. “Library boy!” he chirps, grinning, all sunshine and rainbows until Sanghyuk is sure he will burst into confetti.

“I liked it,” Sanghyuk intones carefully, knowing full well that his opinion might be unwelcome here. “You shouldn’t be scared to show off something you’re good at.”

“I’m not scared, I’m just not finished,” Jaehwan chides, reaching up and tapping the tip of Sanghyuk’s nose with a grey-tinted fingertip. “Did you get my note?”

It’s burning a hole in his wallet, of course, Sanghyuk being almost childishly attached to anything given to him by someone he likes, but he doesn’t think it particularly cool of him to mention as much. So he nods. “It was nice, but I told you to stay still, remember?” His lips turn down into a gentle frown. “Did the bruise get better with the ice?”

“Oh, yeah, it was fine. It hurts now--” and Jaehwan shifts just slightly in his chair as if to prove a point, wincing with the action, “but it’s fine. I’ll be okay. You worry a lot, you know that?”

“I worry about my job,” Sanghyuk says, almost flatly, unamused at Jaehwan’s teasing for just a moment. “And I worry about cute boys that I almost cause grave injury to. Is that so wrong?”

“Wah~ You think I’m cute and I don’t even know who you are~” Jaehwan’s eyes grow large, and almost sparkle.

(Like… Sanghyuk tries to place it… like a manhwa?)

“I’m Han Sanghyuk,” he says after a half-beat-too-long pause. “High school student and reluctant library volunteer, at your service.”

“You forgot ‘injuries expert’,” Jaehwan quips. “High school, huh? You definitely know how to make a hyung feel old.”

“Hyung? I didn’t know, you look so young.” He looks younger than Sanghyuk has felt in years, in fact, but that seems a little dramatic. “Okay, Jaehwan hyung, let me ask you: why do you come up here to draw? Is that part of your work?”

“Ah, ah, nope, we’re not here to talk about me.” Just then Jaehwan’s phone goes off, a Line message, and he holds up a penciled finger to Sanghyuk while he turns to pick it up off the table, just next to his sketchbook. Apparently it’s a very important message -- though Sanghyuk had thought Jaehwan bright before, he positively sunbeams at reading whatever’s contained in the screen. “I have to go home!” he announces, practically yelling with the amount of enthusiasm contained in his voice. “There is someone very, very important waiting for me. Can I see you tomorrow, Cute Library Boy Han Sanghyuk?”

And Sanghyuk’s previously inflated heart sinks a little, hiding in its proper place behind his ribcage instead of soaring into his throat, but he nods. “You can. I’ll be here.”

Jaehwan makes a hasty attempt at shoving his few possessions into his bag, dumping several pens and pencils onto the floor in the process; Sanghyuk, in the interest of apparent urgency, stoops to assist. Their faces are inches apart, and their elbows brush together in the effort. “Thank youuu~” Jaehwan singsongs, slinging his backpack over his shoulder. “See you tomorrow!” He offers an excited wave over his shoulder, nodding, biting back the disappointment that threatens to rise up in him.

Does Jaehwan have someone important? he wonders.

\---

A couple weeks go by like this, with Sanghyuk seeking Jaehwan’s company toward the end of his shift every night, watching him draw and telling him stories about his day at school, who’s breaking up with whom, who’s growing weed behind the dumpsters, who’s getting into a fistfight and secretly hooking up in the janitor’s closets. Jaehwan, for the most part, sort of hums along, his pen or pencil always moving, and at first Sanghyuk doesn’t understand. He thinks that he bores Jaehwan, and worries for more than one night that he’s too young and too inexperienced to hold the elder’s attention. But about a week in he realises that Jaehwan just can’t stop drawing, no matter what he’s doing, and that he’s perfectly capable of doing multiple things at once, a talent for which Sanghyuk envies him. 

Dream Boy™ status cemented, he decides on Day Ten.

And it would have been a kind of fairytale ending, except that on Day Twelve, a Saturday, Jaehwan is not alone in his usual study room, in fact accompanied by a rather handsome older man who sits beside him, one leg draped over his, stretched out languidly while they talk with an ease of conversation that Sanghyuk has never known with Jaehwan.

His heart drops to his knees, and he swallows hard, finding his throat suddenly dry. Was this Someone Important? He was...he was a presence. Like a rainstorm, but with the sunshine peeking in through the clouds. His laugh was high, tinkling, and he did it a lot. He was also very touchy, Sanghyuk observed; whenever he rolled past the study room with his cart, the man was draped over Jaehwan in a different position -- from behind, arms slung around his neck, chin tucked into Jaehwan’s shoulder; resting in his lap, legs and hips bent downward and feet on the floor, cheek pressed into Jaehwan’s hip and nuzzling it carefully; or even just fully seated in his lap, teasingly grabbing at his implements to draw little scribbles in the corners of the page.

Jaehwan looks happy, happier than Sanghyuk has seen him thus far, and honestly? He feels a little guilty, for taking time out of Jaehwan’s day that could be spent with someone who makes him absolutely glow with joy.

The guilt doesn’t really do much to stop him, though. When his shift is near its end and the books are all put back in their proper places and there are enough cards for the rest of the weekend, he makes his way back upstairs, into Jaehwan’s study room, where the other man has both feet up on the table and is lounging back easily in his chair. At the sound of intrusion Jaehwan lifts his eyes from the drawing in front of him and grins his usual grin. “Cute Library Boy!” he greets, waving an inky hand at Sanghyuk, who waves back, albeit weakly.

“Oh, this is Cute Library Boy?” the man asks, folding his hands over his stomach and smiles like he knows all the secrets held in Sanghyuk’s heart. Sanghyuk, for his part, glances away, at the shelves lining the opposite wall, at the sketchbook on Jaehwan’s table, anywhere but the stare drilled into his face by Jaehwan’s companion. “He’s even cuter than you told me he was, Hwannie.” He laughs that bell of a laugh, reaches out and prods Jaehwan in the shoulder, and Jaehwan -- is he blushing? His smile has turned secretive?

“Sanghyuk, this is Hakyeon. Hakyeon, this is Sanghyuk, aka Cute Library Boy, aka The Cute Puppy Who Thinks It’s Cool To Ice A Stranger’s Junk.”

Hakyeon knows the whole story. Sanghyuk is mortified, but just for a second -- then Hakyeon stands, stretches his long arms over his head (his shirt lifts up, exposing a tan sliver of hip between layers of black, and again Sanghyuk has to look away) and crosses the space between the two of them. His eye is still a critical one, though, even as he pulls Sanghyuk into an awkward, limp-wristed sort of handshake.

If he thought Jaehwan could make him blush -- well, Sanghyuk must admit, he doesn’t hold a candle to Hakyeon’s narrowed-eyed stare.

“I’m glad to finally meet you.” Hakyeon smiles, soft, unassuming, completely betraying the fire in his gaze. “It’s hard for me to keep my boyfriend company when he’s here, so it’s definitely reassuring that someone is able to do it.”

“Your boyfriend?” Sanghyuk’s heart is now somewhere on the first floor, having sunk completely from his body and through the floor. He should’ve known. No one is that physically intimate without having been...well, physically intimate. “Right, uh, Jaehwan didn’t tell me he had a boyfriend, but I did know he had Someone Important, so…” They’re still shaking hands for some reason, and Sanghyuk doesn’t let go, just rubs at the back of his head with his free hand. “Anyway, it’s nice to meet you. I have to go get my time card signed by the head librarian before she leaves, so I’ll leave you two alone.”

Why is he fleeing? It’s not as if he laid any claim to Jaehwan or his smiles or his beautiful, art-calloused hands or his laughs. But as he disappears, his back answering Hakyeon’s cheerful ‘see you soon’, he can’t help feeling as if something precious has been stolen from him.

\---

The very next day, a Sunday, Sanghyuk isn’t supposed to go in, but he’s not really feeling like hanging around at home just to watch his mom obsessively clean everything, and he’s too tired to go hang out with anyone, so he ends up back at the library. It’s a little off-putting, to be there when he’s not at work, but he braves it anyway. The assistant librarians greet him warmly, and he smiles and bows and nods and answers all their questions politely. Then he makes his way upstairs, into Jaehwan’s usual study room, and lays down on the table, staring into the lights and listening to their calming, fluorescent hum.

He must drift off a little, because the next thing he knows he’s being gently elbowed in the side. “Hey, good morning, I need you to wake up.”

“Jaehwan?” Sanghyuk mumbles, raising a hand to rub the sleep from his eyes.

The distant voice, pushing through the cloudy haze ringing Sanghyuk’s head, laughs. “No, but it’s definitely cute that you say his name when you first wake up.” Hakyeon. Shit. “Don’t worry, I’m not here to murder you or anything like that. You’re about a head taller than me and with more muscles than I’ll ever get.” Another laugh. Sanghyuk sits up and indeed, Hakyeon is sitting next to him on the table. If the librarians came in here, they’d both get kicked out for sure. “I wanted to ask you something.”

“Uh…” Sanghyuk is still kind of put off by that laugh, because even though Hakyeon assures his intent isn’t evil, his tone of voice tells a different story. “Yeah, sure, hyung. Go ahead.”

And Hakyeon is alarming levels of forward when he curls his lips up into a smirk and say, “Do you like my boyfriend?” If Sanghyuk had been drinking something it’d have come out his nose just then. “I’m not angry if you do, mostly because… well, reasons. And it really is like I told you yesterday, I don’t like him being alone, but I can’t always be with him. But talking to people...helps him, I guess? To process ideas and things.”

“You love him,” Sanghyuk breathes once he can speak through the sudden burn in his throat at having almost choked to death.

“I do, but that doesn’t have any bearing on the question. So if you’d please answer it for me?” And Hakyeon’s sharp, tired face goes soft, almost pleading. “I promise not to be angry no matter what you say.”

Sanghyuk is quiet for a long moment, hands folded on his stomach. He doesn’t look at Hakyeon’s eyes, the way they suddenly grow misty where Jaehwan’s well-being is concerned. He stares at the ceiling lights, listens to their fluorescent hum, and takes a deep breath before answering.

“I like Jaehwan a lot,” he says, feeling guilty with every letter. “But he’s your boyfriend, and it kind of sucks?”

“Mm.” Hakyeon nods, and that sharpness is right back in place. “It’s okay. There’s still a lot of stuff you don’t know, and it’s not my place to tell you, so I won’t. But if you would please just...check on him? Maybe remind him to text back every once in awhile?”

Hakyeon sounds more like a doting mother than a boyfriend, Sanghyuk notes in the back of his mind. It’s really sweet, in that way that makes worry edge into the corners of his mind. “I will. Since you asked so nicely.”

And Hakyeon, pleased as pie, leans over Sanghyuk’s sprawled-out form, grinning...and presses a little kiss to the corner of Sanghyuk’s mouth.

“Thank you.”

“You’re...welcome, I think.” Sanghyuk hadn’t considered Hakyeon much, but this little encounter, seeing how much he worried over his boyfriend, was exceptionally endearing, and suddenly he was hit with it: A Reason. Another Reason? Was that even…

But before he has time to really fret about it, Hakyeon is positively bouncing out, waving over his shoulder. “See you later, Sanghyuk-ah~ Don’t forget your promise, okay?”

Sanghyuk, who had craned his neck for the sole purpose of watching Hakyeon leave (and maybe, after that kiss, watching him walk away too), slumps back down onto the tabletop. He didn’t come to the library for complicated, and yet…

\---

He really does keep his promises over the next week. Monday rolls around and he goes to school, considers skipping his shift at the library just because he can, but Hakyeon’s words -- and warm, slightly-chapped lips -- keep him from doing as much. He goes through the motions of his shift, does his duties, but his mind is very obviously elsewhere, and it gets him the wrong kind of attention in the form of another lecture from the head librarian. He doesn’t really care, though, because whenever he’s on the second floor he makes absolutely sure to detour his cart-pushing routine past Jaehwan’s study room.

Jaehwan is so precious when he’s drawing, Sanghyuk notes with a sigh. Rumpled shirt covered in stains in a million different shades of grey and black, hair pushed back from his forehead, the very tip of a pink tongue poking out from between his lips, offset by the streaks of pencil decorating his cheek. After getting kissed by Hakyeon, he’s basically given himself free reign over his fantasies, so somewhere between card-stamping and patron-directing he’s got it in his mind that at the end of his shift he’s going to go into that damned study room, crawl into Jaehwan’s lap and kiss him for all he’s worth.

But...what if it’s only okay when Hakyeon does it?

Halfway caught between desire and instinct is where the end of Sanghyuk’s shift leaves him, and he’s really considering the instinct bit when he makes his way up to the room to keep Jaehwan company. Jaehwan lifts his head and there are dark circles under his eyes, his mouth is set seriously, but his stare is that same sparkly one that Sanghyuk has come to know and (God help him) love. “Hi, Cute Library Sanghyuk,” he greets, and his voice is a croak, one that doesn’t match the sunshine in his eyes, which worries Sanghyuk even more.

“Um, have...have you eaten?” he asks through numb lips. “You just...I brought a big lunch today but didn’t eat most of it and wanted to know if you wanted to share it with me.”

Here Jaehwan cracks into a smile. “The only thing I like more than spending time with you is eating,” he says. “Or, well, probably, anyway. Since we haven’t actually done it yet.”

Sanghyuk, once again, is so fucked. He waits patiently for Jaehwan to pack up his drawings into his knapsack, helps when necessary, when Jaehwan seems to drag his knuckles, slowed by sleepiness, slipping into semi-consciousness, obviously in need of sleep. Food isn’t the best substitute, but again, Hakyeon’s words (and kiss, tasting vaguely of vanilla lip balm) ring in his head. He made a promise. He will keep it. Besides, Jaehwan probably would have fallen asleep at the table and woken up the next morning to serious reprimands by the librarians had Sanghyuk not come and gotten him, and while the idea is cute, it’s also uncomfortable in that he would be alone.

Sanghyuk really, really, really does not want Jaehwan to be alone. Especially when he looks like this.

So maybe if, when Jaehwan’s fingers slip between Sanghyuk’s as they’re tottering down the stairs, Sanghyuk’s dosirak in his empty hand, he doesn’t blush...that’s okay, right? Jaehwan just isn’t doing well right now. He’s taking care of a friend. A Really Cute Friend.

They sit in Jaehwan’s car -- Jaehwan has a car, and Sanghyuk is positively amazed, didn’t particularly think that Jaehwan, with his short attention span for anything that isn’t a sketchbook, would be able to drive -- in the backseat, legs kicked up over one another and draped together. They share Sanghyuk’s refrigerated leftovers, Jaehwan absolutely cheering about how good it is. No matter how much he wants to, Sanghyuk doesn’t take credit for the cooking, gives all of it to his mom (“is she single?” Jaehwan asks with a suggestive wiggle of his eyebrows, and Sanghyuk gently punches him in the chest for even joking that far). When the food is gone, Jaehwan curls up, decidedly happier, more alive, his head in Sanghyuk’s lap.

(Quietly, Sanghyuk prays his dick doesn’t do any weird moves, but knows he’s not in control.)

He cards his fingers through Jaehwan’s honey-brown hair, gently at first, but then dragging his blunt nails slowly back and forth against Jaehwan’s scalp.

“Did you know I was into scratching,” Jaehwan mumbles sleepily, “or was it just a guess?”

Sanghyuk smiles in spite of himself. “I just like doing things with you, no matter what they are.”

Jaehwan turns, grunting quietly as he does so, and suddenly his face is turned up toward Sanghyuk’s, and his eyes are lit by the dim bulbs surrounding the parking lot, and the moon, and Sanghyuk has never in his life felt more like kissing someone.

So he does, cheeks pink, breath hitched in his throat, lips moving softly against Jaehwan’s. 

And Jaehwan tastes of gochujang and happiness, and his ink-stained hands wrap around Sanghyuk’s wrist, pulling him in closer.

Once more, for those in the back: Han Sanghyuk is So Fucked.

\---

What do you bring someone you’ve been thinking about kissing again for the last seven days? Sanghyuk doesn’t really know, has never been in this situation. It’s kind of a date, if one of those chill, lazy, at-home affairs that will probably end up in slow makeouts on the couch (if Sanghyuk has his way, which he usually does). But isn’t it customary to bring a gift to an adult sort of affair?

A frantic websearch tells him little that he hadn’t figured out on his own -- wine (which he can’t buy), fancy imported cheese (which he can’t afford), flowers (which absolutely scream This Is A Date And Not A Subtle Attempt To Maybe Possibly Kiss You Again). He doesn’t know what to do. And he doesn’t know who to ask. The only person who could maybe tell him is Hakyeon, and that...well, it’d defeat the purpose a little, wouldn’t it.

Besides, he’d forgotten to get Hakyeon’s number the last time he’d seen him, which had been a mistake in and of itself.

Maybe this entire affair is a mistake? (He keeps using the word affair, although only in private -- the word makes him feel kind of like the young madam, which is gross, and causes him to scrub himself bright red while he’s getting ready to go to Jaehwan’s.) Maybe he should just be honest. A conversation about What, Exactly, Is Going On would really get him some sleep at night.

But every time he’s had the opportunity since that kiss in the back of Jaehwan’s car, he’s kind of lost courage, afraid to lose what little toehold he already has.

So he makes himself look as nice as he can -- church clothes he never wears from the back of his closet, hair half swept up and away from his forehead in a way that he deems ‘mature’, fancy cologne that he’s never felt insecure enough to need. He brushes his teeth three times before he’s satisfied. When his mom asks him where he’s going, he clams up almost immediately, blushes, makes some excuse about how he’s been invited to an event with some friends, tries to be as nonspecific as possible so he doesn’t have to feel bad for lying much later.

It doesn’t need to be said, but he’s So Fucked.

The ride to Jaehwan’s apartment feels like it takes way too long, and Sanghyuk checks his phone about a million times. He should be used to it -- it’s not far from his school or the library where he works, just a couple stops up the line -- but his anxiety about the night is starting to drive him up the wall. If he could just get a good, solid ninja run up the subway wall, in fact, he’d be doing pretty well. Feeling confident. Ready to take on at least an entire village.

When he disembarks the train it’s just a couple blocks’ walk to the apartment building, but the weather is exceptionally warm this evening, and he deeply regrets dressing well for what he’d known in advance would be something of a stroll. He checks himself obsessively for stains or scuffs or unintentional wrinkles as he makes his way into the lobby of the apartment building and into the elevator.

There’s someone else there, already, a pretty sort of man the likes of which Sanghyuk thought only existed in high-fashion magazines. They make polite chitchat, Sanghyuk absentmindedly wiping his palms on his thighs a few times as they discuss the weather with a laugh. It so happens that they’re going to the same floor, and when Sanghyuk comments on as much, the stranger asks which apartment he’s looking for. “Since you don’t live here,” the man says, trying to be a comfort. “I’ve lived here forever, I know all my neighbours.”

Sanghyuk, in disbelief that he actually gets to do this, rattles off the number he’d memorised two days ago in a message from Jaehwan, and the man lights up, smiles bright, exposing perfect teeth and deep, shadowy dimples. “I live next door, actually. It’s down here.” He waves Sanghyuk along, points at the door. “Tell Jaehwan-ssi I said hello, please,” says the Mysterious Neighbour as he unlocks his front door and slips inside. When the door opens a crack there is nothing but music, a low hum of bass interrupted by a brief second of what sounds like a guitar sample and some very enthusiastic singing.

No wonder Jaehwan spends all his time at the library, bent over his sketchbook. Sanghyuk doesn’t know that he himself could deal with that amount of consistent noise, nor can he imagine what it sounds like filtering through the walls. 

He stands at Jaehwan’s door for a long minute, slowly picking up slivers of courage, one by one, in order to bring himself to knock. Jaehwan had invited him, and had seemed really happy about the whole thing, and there might be kisses involved. So he swallows hard, lifts his hand, presses the button and peers into the camera, resisting the urge to make a silly face.

(It gets the best of him. He hears Jaehwan’s laugh from inside the door, and it melts his nerves away almost instantly.)

When Jaehwan’s front door swings open to reveal him, though, his anxiety amps right back up again. Jaehwan’s hair is mussed, probably from having woken up sometime in the last hour or so, and he’s wearing sweats and a t-shirt, and his smile is tired, but bright. Shit. Had Sanghyuk somehow miscalculated the gravity of the situation? In this case, he seems to be crashing down to earth in a lump of his own tangled limbs. Metaphorically. Maybe literally -- Jaehwan always manages to floor him in one way or another.

“You look nice,” he says, taking a step back and waving Sanghyuk inside. “If I had known you would go to all this effort for me, I might have ended my nap a little earlier.”

Sanghyuk, in the process of slowly toeing off his shoes and leaving them in the doorway, glances up. “You’re fine.” Which is an understatement. “I always like to greet new places in my best possible condition.”

Jaehwan beams. “Your best condition is consistent with you hanging out with me,” he teases. “Clothes or no clothes.”

The implication is there and Sanghyuk’s face is burning. The foyer doesn’t reveal much, and for a moment he thinks the apartment will be one of those built-for-one affairs, but once Jaehwan leads him down the tiny hallway just a few steps, it opens up into a large living room, furnished neatly, with a long couch against the back wall and a low-hanging mirror just behind.

“C’mon, let’s sit down. I ordered food already, and kind of guessed at what you like.” Jaehwan is so pleasant to listen to, going on about how he based their takeout order on the food that Sanghyuk had fed him. “It’s nowhere as good as your mom’s cooking, nothing is really as good as homecooked food, but I like it a lot, so…”

Only then, as Jaehwan trails off, does it occur to Sanghyuk that they are, in fact, both nervous. That someone could feel the same way about his presence as he does about theirs is absolutely monumental to him, and as he sinks into the couch, the springs creaking quietly under their combined weight, he finds himself on the metaphorical ground again.

“I keep meaning to ask you, does Hakyeon hyung live here, too?” Sanghyuk murmurs, curling his legs up underneath himself and turning to face Jaehwan, chin in his palm, elbow propped up on the back of the couch.

“He does.” Jaehwan raises an eyebrow. “Has hyung been good to you? I know he can be a little...Hakyeon.”

For a second Sanghyuk’s mind lingers on that brief kiss Hakyeon had given him, and he nods. “He’s been good. Although I don’t know what you mean by that. Usually people actually use words when they’re describing someone.”

“Words?” Jaehwan laughs, a hand resting against his stomach. “You know I don’t do well with words so much as pictures. And I would. But now I’m curious, Cute Sanghyuk In My Apartment, why are you worried about where Hakyeon hyung might be?”

Because I wanted to spend time with you. “I don’t know, I’m not used to...the both of you, I guess? It’s only been the one time.” And the one time after.

“Oh, yeah, you will. Everyone gets used to us.” He flashes those charming eyes, and Sanghyuk is helpless to defend himself once again. “We’ve always been like that.”

Suddenly desperate for a change of subject, Sanghyuk pipes in, his voice considerably strained, “So why do you look so tired today, hyung? Have you been doing some more of your mysterious work?”

Jaehwan’s glee melts away, face turning secretive, lips pursed to make him look more withdrawn. For a moment he comes off...shy. Or maybe a little upset? Sanghyuk isn’t much of an emotional person, doesn’t know how to read people he’s known for years, but he could swear that he’s touched a nerve. But then Jaehwan smiles, nods. “I had a deadline recently -- last week, when you fed me -- and another last night.” Full of trepidation, Sanghyuk doesn’t press further, but then Jaehwan volunteers, “Would you like to see what I’ve been working on since I finished?”

“You’re always working, hyung,” Sanghyuk chides, wrinkling his nose, but Jaehwan’s already pulled out his phone, unlocked it, and is scrolling through his camera roll. When he stops upon a particular photo, his mouth forms a perfect ‘o’. Then he breaks into that full-lipped smile that makes Sanghyuk melt a little, and he flashes the screen.

Sanghyuk, breathless, takes in the image of -- himself, in manhwa form, a superhero, a mess of lines needing ink but beautiful nonetheless. His shaggy hair that he usually wears to school, and his uniform but amped up, tighter, the edges neater, more efficient for fighting crime, presumably. “You...made me?”

“Of course I did,” Jaehwan scoffs, pretending to be offended. “I draw everyone I kiss.”

Overcome with emotion, Sanghyuk does something he could have never predicted himself doing -- he reaches out, takes Jaehwan into his arms and pulls him in for a tight hug. “This is the coolest thing anyone’s ever done for me,” he breathes into Jaehwan’s mussed-up hair, and Jaehwan laughs softly into Sanghyuk’s chest, puffed-out breath warm through the fabric of his dress shirt.

After a full minute of this embrace, Sanghyuk feels comfortable letting go, and loosens his hold on Jaehwan, who peers up at him with those anime eyes and smiles softly. “Do you get like this often? If so, maybe you and Hakyeon hyung would be better suited than I though.”

“Kiss me again,” Sanghyuk says, nonsequitur, frowning a little. And Jaehwan does as he’s told, slinging one arm around the back of Sanghyuk’s neck and drawing him into a soft kiss. He climbs into Sanghyuk’s lap, straddling, giving himself better leverage so that he can take control. Their mouths meld seamlessly, and just like that, Sanghyuk is So Fucked all over again. He can feel the heat of Jaehwan’s body pressed flush against his own, and kisses back more desperately in response when he feels the slight hum of a whine kissed into his mouth.

Jaehwan squirms in his lap, and Sanghyuk slides his hands down Jaehwan’s back, feeling the contours of his shoulderblades, then dips lower to rest at the small, fingertips creeping into the plush swell of Jaehwan’s ass. He’s about to go for the gold, so to speak, grab hold of Jaehwan and pull him closer, fingertips biting bruises into the curve of his flesh, and then --

“Jyani~” The front door swings open, announcing an interloper upon their affair.

Fuck.

Jaehwan doesn’t notice. Or doesn’t care. Not like they haven’t had this happen before, anyway, the only difference is that Hakyeon is actually, physically here instead of just metaphorically the elephant in the car (and Sanghyuk has a brief flashback to the moments after that first kiss he shared with Jaehwan, to the moments right after Jaehwan’s car has pulled out of the library parking lot, when he knows he has to start walking or else he’ll miss the last train home, but he can’t will his leaden legs to move along already; the anxiety of what he had just done crushed down upon his ribs, a stone, heavy, rooting him to the same spot).

Hakyeon is here, and Sanghyuk is kissing his boyfriend, has his boyfriend wrapped him around him, ribbon-tight, curled up.

And Hakyeon is holding their dinner -- three cartons, not two, how could Sanghyuk have been so ridiculous? -- and saying something about “the delivery boy was in the lobby, the usual one, the one from the Christmas party, I can’t believe you, Lee Jaehwan, we’re never going to get away without tipping huge again -- “ His voice rounds the corner just before he does, and he pauses, a perfect eyebrow arched.

Then, without saying anything, Hakyeon goes into the kitchen, waving over his shoulder. “Hi, Sanghyuk. Welcome to our home. Make yourself a little more comfortable, won’t you?” And he sounds happy? What? Sanghyuk is confused and his dick is kind of hard and Jaehwan, perfect Jaehwan, is still curled in his lap, poised for another kiss, and maybe it could be more conspicuous. Maybe they could still be joined at the mouth. That would’ve been a dead giveaway, wouldn’t it? 

The clink of dishes from the kitchen, just beyond the living room, seems to snap Jaehwan out of his partial-makeout daze, and he shifts just slightly, tightens his knees around Sanghyuk’s hips in something of a taunt, then climbs away from him, trotting into the kitchen. Sanghyuk, dumbfounded, is stuck there, heart pounding fast, and he should probably go get his food, not be a completely rude guest (because not helping with the distribution of dinner is the pinnacle of rudeness in this situation). Hakyeon emerges, holding a large tray of various dishes full of steaming food, just as Sanghyuk is about to enter, waves him away with a precarious nod of his head.

“You look good tonight, Sanghyukkie,” Hakyeon murmurs fondly, leaning over the load in his arms to press a kiss to Sanghyuk’s forehead. “Thank you for keeping your promise.”

Jaehwan comes out with a similar tray, stacked with drinks, beer and a bottle of wine and what looks like a couple different flavours of soda, and he, too, kisses Sanghyuk on the forehead, smiling softly. “You worry too much, you know that?” he teases, nose crinkling up as he makes his way past Sanghyuk as well. Both he and Hakyeon are setting up their takeout dinner on the coffee table, and Sanghyuk watches, mouth agape, face flush with rushing blood.

“What just happened,” he whispers to himself, moving to join them. 

He notices as he approaches from behind the tired slump of Hakyeon’s shoulder, and when he takes his seat around the table, sandwiched between the pair of them, Hakyeon flashes a slow but brief smile. “Let’s eat well,” he says, and his voice has a rasp that Sanghyuk isn’t familiar with (hasn’t memorised yet). He’s dressed in form-fitting clothes, all black, and his hair is still a little damp from… from what? Being outside? Walking home from the train, just as Sanghyuk himself had done?

“How was your day?” he ventures, and Hakyeon’s smile slips on once more.

“It was really good, actually. The lessons I taught today were special in that I got to spend time with kids with disabilities--”

“That was today?” Jaehwan asks through a mouthful of rice.

“--and some of them want to come back last week,” Hakyeon finishes, tone fond.

“Lessons?” Sanghyuk questions.

“Oh, right, I didn’t tell you, and Jyani here probably didn’t either.” Hakyeon sets down his chopsticks to reach around Sanghyuk’s back and ruffle Jaehwan’s hair, affectionate, but stern. “I’m a dance teacher. I used to want to be a professional, but… I love my kids too much to keep up all the time it takes.”

Sanghyuk hums quietly, nodding, eyes wide and focused sharply on Hakyeon’s animated speech as he takes a bite of kimchi. When he clears his mouth again he smiles softly. “It sounds like you’re really happy.”

Hakyeon casts a quick look at Jaehwan, and Sanghyuk is just close enough that he can feel the shift of Jaehwan’s body as he shrugs. Then he gives a longer, more lingering look to Sanghyuk himself, and that smile turns sharp in the way it had been when they’d first met, and Sanghyuk’s heart leaps in his chest. “I’m definitely happy right now,” he says, and there’s layers of meaning to it, and the air between the three of them is suddenly kind of tense. Or maybe it’s just Sanghyuk wanting to set his chopsticks aside and pull Hakyeon into a kiss, of the kind that he was just giving Jaehwan a few minutes prior.

But he’s still got so many questions (???).

Who doesn’t get mad about someone kissing their boyfriend?

He might have been So Fucked before, but he’s doubly so now.

They finish dinner quietly, making small conversation, talking about the rest of Hakyeon’s day, about what’s happening with Sanghyuk at school (he’s so close to graduation he can taste it, even though it’s a term away; they nod sympathetically and give brief synopses of their own experiences), and Jaehwan...well, he doesn’t talk much at all, mostly just agrees with the two conversationalists and looks as if his mind is elsewhere.

That, of course, unnerves Sanghyuk once again, but only briefly. “Hakyeon hyung,” he says, nudging Hakyeon in the ribcage with a soft elbow, “Jaehwan hyung won’t tell me what he does for a living…”

“That’s not so odd,” Hakyeon points out, “plenty of adults don’t like to talk about their jobs. Jyani here is just kind of sensitive, is all.”

“I’m listening,” Jaehwan supplements, gazing past the both of them, “I really am, I’m just thinking about deadlines and stuff…”

Hakyeon frowns. “You haven’t slept.” It’s not phrased as a question, and Sanghyuk is caught off-guard by how affectionately worried it sounds for such a quick sentence. “When we’re done here, you’re going to take a shower, and then we’re going to sleep.”

Right about now is when Sanghyuk figures he’s going to have to go soon, and he braces himself for being told that he’s going to be kicked out directly after dinner. But Hakyeon turns to him and nods, placing his free hand on Sanghyuk’s shoulder. “Do you want to spend the night with us?”

The implication nearly makes Sanghyuk’s heart burst. But he keeps it calm, wondering if intentions and actions are going to coincide. “I wouldn’t mind not having to catch the last train, it’s a bit of a long ride…”

Of course, this is exactly what both Jaehwan and Hakyeon wanted, judging by their expressions of complete and total delight at Sanghyuk agreeing to the proposal. “That’s good, then,” Hakyeon says briskly, “I don’t want you going home in the dark, either.” 

Sanghyuk’s throat is suddenly dry, and he doesn’t really have words for the way he’s shaking, and he doesn’t want to be here, if only because he doesn’t want to mess up this actual fantasy come true. He flashes back to a brief remnant of a dream he’d had a few nights prior, of both Hakyeon’s and Jaehwan’s arms wrapped around him, Hakyeon’s mouth at his collarbone, Jaehwan’s at the nape of his neck, their breaths mingling with a thin sheen of sweat forming on his skin…

But he shakes it away. He’ll probably sleep on the couch for tonight. It’s too soon to be entertaining such thoughts, especially when he has so many questions on his mind.

After dinner, Hakyeon and Sanghyuk clear the dishes while Jaehwan goes to shower as he’s told. Standing at the sink, Sanghyuk pushes up the sleeves of his well-pressed button-up halfway up to his elbows so that he can clean everything. Hakyeon looks relieved that he doesn’t have to do much more work, save for pointing out where in the dishwasher things go, so he hops up on the counter. Sanghyuk finds it difficult not to stare at the length of his legs, clad in black, slim but firm, toned well -- probably from years and years of dancing.

“How did you meet Jaehwan?” Sanghyuk asks, trying to make conversation in order to distract himself from the pair of eyes following his every move. “Have you been together long?”

“A couple years,” Hakyeon replies airily, smiling in that slow way again that makes Sanghyuk shiver, pleased. “We met at university -- I wasn’t far from graduating, and Jaehwan was dead in the middle of everything. He wasn’t too good academically, and neither was I, and for some reason we ended up in the same foreign language class. We studied Japanese together. Badly, I might add.” He laughs, and the sound of it is almost the exact opposite of Jaehwan’s, low and husky and happy in a way that seems almost lost. “We’ve lived together ever since, just kind of struggling to make ends meet, but...we’re happy. Does that make sense?”

“It does.” Sanghyuk stops what he’s doing, shuts off the sink, wipes his wet palms on the backs of his thighs. “So can I ask you why you’re okay with me kissing your boyfriend?”

“Oh, see, I knew you’d ask about that!” Hakyeon pouts, just a little, and Sanghyuk finds it endearing how childish such an adult can look in the span of a single question. “Okay, so, we’re...I don’t know. The word is poly, but it doesn’t...I don’t know, I’m not really into words like that. It sounds clinical. Basically we just love each other, but love other people too, sometimes.” He hums, ruminating on the words to say next and effectively stopping Sanghyuk from interrupting his train of thought. “It’s because he’s my best friend. The relationship we have can’t be broken up. So no, before you ask, I don’t really get jealous that people kiss Jaehwan from time to time. I mean, have you seen him? Have you spoken to him? To keep him to myself and only myself would be to deny the world a great pleasure.”

“And...I hate to be self-centered, but--”

“What does it have to do with you?” Hakyeon’s tone is vaguely flat, but his expression shows great interest, assuaging Sanghyuk of his fears. “Well, Jaehwan loved you from the time he first met you. That’s pretty much a given. He’s definitely one of those people, the kind who fall in love on sight. But he didn’t want me to meet you at first, because he didn’t know if it was really his feelings or just how cute he thought you were. We haven’t had another person involved in our relationship in a little while, so it could’ve been a little confusing for more than just you to invite you into our lives immediately.”

“Did you like me immediately?” Sanghyuk murmurs, crossing the tiny space of the kitchen, getting close enough to Hakyeon that his hips brush against the elder’s knees. “Are you one of those people?”

“Only sometimes. Not in your case. But in my case, it takes a good kiss.” Hakyeon’s steady grin is going to be the death of him, Sanghyuk swears. But then Hakyeon’s elegant hands reach into the front of Sanghyuk’s shirt, and he feels himself tugged closer, feels Hakyeon’s knees pressing carefully into his hips. “I like you, Sanghyuk. You keep your promises, and you’re gentle with Jaehwan where other people have been harsh, and you’re not particularly demanding. But I don’t know if you’re the one for us quite yet. So…” 

His voice is low, and there’s a soft pattering of footsteps from somewhere else in the apartment -- Jaehwan, out of the shower. Sanghyuk almost hesitates, glances away, but Hakyeon’s fingers tighten in his shirt, wrinkling the fabric and pulling him closer. “Help me, would you?” Hakyeon suggests in something just barely hovering over a whisper.

“I…” And Hakyeon smells of vanilla lip balm and warm food and a little bit of cinnamon, smiles like the slowly catching embers of a fire, and Sanghyuk is So, So, So Fucked anyway, so he just...does what his body tells him is right, screams for him to do, and leans in, pressing his mouth softly against Hakyeon’s, tracing the tip of his tongue along the bow of Hakyeon’s upper lip.

They stay like this, lips whispering softly against one another’s, Sanghyuk’s hands finding Hakyeon’s slim hips and pressing what are sure to be bruises into his soft skin through the material of his leggings. Hakyeon whines, quiet, into the kiss, sliding his palms down the front of Sanghyuk’s chest, blunt fingernails catching in the miniscule hollows between his ribs. 

He thinks this can’t possibly get any better, that the lack of space between himself and Hakyeon can’t get any sweeter, that the breath being snatched from his lungs in the heat of this kiss couldn’t get any more overwhelming, but then...he feels another pair of arms, wrapping around his waist, holding him tight, plush lips pressed against the curve of his shoulder.

“Hi,” he hears Jaehwan murmur in his ear, “we’re glad you came over.”

Sanghyuk has to physically force himself to stop kissing Hakyeon, and does so only with a last, longing nip at his upper lip before turning his head to glance at Jaehwan’s profile in his periphery. “I’m glad I came over, too,” he breathes, and lets Jaehwan capture his mouth in another kiss, Hakyeon’s mouth situated directly over the point of his thrumming pulse in his neck.

\---

They don’t have sex that night, but they do become inseparable from the very moment of that kiss in the kitchen. The next morning Sanghyuk ignores a number of texts and calls from his family, worried after his well-being, in favour of spending the morning curled up between Jaehwan and Hakyeon, and occasionally switching around for the sake of comfortable, putting someone else in the middle instead. A lot of affectionately-voiced conversations are had about what this might mean for them, about how Sanghyuk is allowed over whenever he wants, about how they’re more than happy to take care of him however he’d like to be taken care of. 

They take hours to disentangle, a mass of limbs, a mess of kisses and whispered words and long gazes into one another’s eyes. There’s something so intimate about looking someone in the face as you lay in their arms, Sanghyuk notices, which is something no one has ever thought to tell him before.

Hakyeon, always the physical person, traces the lines of Sanghyuk’s face when Jaehwan is the last of them to wake up in the morning, memorising them, murmuring softly how pretty Sanghyuk is and how lucky they are to have found him. Sanghyuk, in return, blushes and speaks in few, but powerful, words about how greatly he admires each of them, fingers wrapped loosely around Hakyeon’s hip, trying to pull him closer only to have Jaehwan, still asleep, wrap tighter around him.

He’s never felt so content.

At subsequent nights (which become weeks, and slowly drift into months) at their apartment, slowly integrating into their relationship becomes something of a second nature. He learns each of their little routines -- how Jaehwan needs to eat as soon as he gets home from working at the library or else he’ll forget, or how Hakyeon likes his shoulders rubbed when he makes it back from work, or what they like on their takeout orders. He learns the differences in their mornings -- Jaehwan would sleep until three in the afternoon if he could, but Hakyeon is a definite morning person, up before anyone else and making coffee for Sanghyuk, who doesn’t want to get out of bed, but has to anyway for school. He learns that he, himself, actually makes a happy medium between the two of them, and the few arguments between any two of them are best settled by a third. He learns that Jaehwan, when he works toward his mysterious deadlines, gets dirtier, his face covered in charcoal, his fingers stained dark, dark, dark with ink; the circles beneath his eyes grow deeper; he forgets to eat constantly, and to sleep even more. So Hakyeon and Sanghyuk, together, have the job of convincing him to take care of himself.

He also learns what it’s like to wake up to kisses, to fingers slotted between his own, to being held by someone who tells him that he’s gorgeous, that he deserves the world. He learns that it’s possible for two people to love each other, and also love him, and for no one to get jealous, or pair off and leave someone out when all three of them are together. He learns a little about himself -- that he likes Hakyeon’s cooking even though Jaehwan makes fun of it, that he prefers to be on the outside with Hakyeon in the dead center of their cuddles so they can dote on their hyung, that he doesn’t really mind the sound of the neighbours’ music spilling in through the air conditioning vents because it gives him background noise to which to study. He learns that he’s happy, that he’s smarter than he gave himself credit for, that Hakyeon is good at languages and Jaehwan good at compositions and higher-level maths He learns that he’s…

He’s a little bit in love. With both of them. And the realisation hits him, a train going three hundred kilometers an hour, full of feelings that grow stronger with each and every single day.

He might be So Fucked, but Sanghyuk is ready for it now, knows how to talk to them, knows how to explain his feelings in the most comfortable way possible, knows that Hakyeon will smile like he’s known all along, that Jaehwan will be blindsided and beam like he’s so proud, that they will fall into bed with one another, finally complete in the knowledge that what they have is real.

So he spends a month working up the courage, ends up having the conversation first with Hakyeon, a couple days before his graduation.

They’re sitting on the couch, watching some informational program on the jungle, Hakyeon draped over Sanghyuk’s lap, head pillowed on his thigh and Sanghyuk’s hand tangled in Hakyeon’s hair, scritching gently at his scalp. “I have a question,” he says, soft, during a commercial break, right when Hakyeon is about to go get his usual bottle of water, having emptied the last one moments before. “And I don’t know how to ask it, but I figured you’d be the better one to ask in this situation.”

Hakyeon, half-tense from the effort of trying to want to get out of this position, relaxes immediately, turning just enough so that he can gaze into Sanghyuk’s face. “Ask away, little one.”

“So…” Sanghyuk chews anxiously at his lower lip, and Hakyeon, seeing his nerves apparent in his face, reaches up and cups his cheek, drags his thumb comfortingly along the hollow beneath Sanghyuk’s eye. “I wanted to tell you something, actually, and ask you how to tell Jaehwan, too.”

“I’m listening.” The comfort of Hakyeon’s touch is incredible, and Sanghyuk’s nerves melt away one by one.

“I...I love you, Hakyeon.”

The moment is still, and Hakyeon smiles, just as Sanghyuk had known he would. “I love you, too, Sanghyuk. You know I do.” Hakyeon had said it a few weeks before, in one of those lazy Sunday morning snuggles, whispered it right into Sanghyuk’s ear, which turned pink in the exact next moment, pleased, embarrassed. “But that’s not a question.”

“Well...obviously I love Jaehwan, too.” He gently leans into Hakyeon’s hand on his face. “But telling him should be a big deal. Something special. And I don’t know what that is.”

Hakyeon sits up, eyebrows raised. “You’re serious,” he says, face suddenly void of expression. “Very, very serious, our Sanghyukkie.” Teasingly, he tweaks the rounded tip of Sanghyuk’s nose before climbing into his lap, wrapping legs around his waist and bouncing carefully. “What do you want to do?”

“I don’t know,” Sanghyuk admits, craning slightly and resting his forehead against Hakyeon’s, completely ignoring the jostling. At the beginning of their relationship -- hell, even as recently as a month ago -- he probably would’ve been focusing on keeping his dick under restraint, but it doesn’t bother him. Serious Business is taking place. “I just...Jaehwan is so special. To me. And to you. And I want him to have the nice stuff, you know? And I can’t buy him anything like a gift to go along with my confession, and I can’t drink with him after, and --”

Hakyeon reaches up, presses a finger to Sanghyuk’s lips to shush him. “You sound like me, when you should sound like you. What do you think you should do? And don’t tell me. I like surprises.”

That’s not true, Hakyeon hates surprises, but…

Sanghyuk suddenly breaks into a smile, the gears of his brain clicking into the correct position. “I know what I need to do.”

Hakyeon smiles right back, until his eyes curve up into moons, almost disappearing. “Then do it.”

\---

The morning after Sanghyuk graduates, he’s sporting a hangover, a hickey bigger than any he’s ever had before (the combined efforts of his boyfriends, he supposes, though he doesn’t remember clearly if it was one mouth after the other or if he’s got the order wrong), and a plan. He’s got a piece of paper, and is sitting at the kitchen table, carefully drawing lines on lines on lines, when Hakyeon bustles his way into the kitchen, stopping only for a moment to press his lips to the crown of Sanghyuk’s head.

“I like it,” he says of Sanghyuk’s drawing, and Sanghyuk beams, head still lowered. “He’ll be up soon, we went to bed early last night.”

“I know. I have time.” Jaehwan won’t actually be out of bed for an hour or so, by Sanghyuk’s very attentive estimate. But it’s better to be safe than sorry. So he sketches more quickly, uses more of the eraser, squinting hard to keep his headache from splitting his brain in two and rendering him unable to finish this project.

When the drawing is finished, forty-five minutes later...it looks nothing like anything Jaehwan has ever drawn. Not even close. Sanghyuk just isn’t the drawing type, has always been better at reading manhwa than creating it in any sense, but…

He holds it up, eyes narrowed, trying to see it clearly. And it does the job just fine. So he signs it with a little note -- “I’m in love with both of you. Be my boyfriends.” -- and takes it into the bedroom, setting it carefully between empty bottles of alcohol, turning it so that it will catch Jaehwan’s eye, when he finally wakes up.

Jaehwan, the cutest human being alive when asleep, is curled around a body pillow. Sanghyuk has seen it before, somewhere, in one of his serials that he reads obsessively. Well, not the pillow itself, but the character printed on it. He’s a dashing anti-villain, who looks suspiciously like something of Jaehwan’s own creation. But...that’s not possible.

Distracted, he watches Jaehwan sleep a moment longer, then crawls into bed with him, fitting around him as he’s fit around that pillow, drooling a little onto its chest. Sanghyuk kisses Jaehwan’s shoulder, and pretends to sleep, nervously anticipating the result of this little experiment.

It takes a good ten minutes for Jaehwan to come around, but eventually he stirs, pokes up his head, and sees the drawing, which he immediately picks up with one hand, the other going to his eyes to rub the sleep from them. “What is…”

Sanghyuk knows, but wants to see anyway, so he, faux-bleary, ‘wakes up’ as well. And Jaehwan turns to him immediately, holds the drawing up to Sanghyuk’s face so he can see his own handiwork.

The picture is one of himself, Jaehwan and Hakyeon, all stretched out and laying on one another on the living room couch, Jaehwan’s head in Sanghyuk’s lap and Sanghyuk’s head resting against Hakyeon’s chest. They all hold hands, Hakyeon reaching over Sanghyuk’s shoulder to cling to Jaehwan, Sanghyuk with an arm around Jaehwan’s neck, and Sanghyuk and Hakyeon’s free hands linked in Hakyeon’s lap.

They all look content. The way Sanghyuk feels they all are when they’re together.

And Jaehwan’s eyes brim with a couple tears, so overcome is he with the feeling of this gesture.

“Are you gonna answer me, hyung?” Sanghyuk says, biting back the brightest of grins.

“Absolutely, I will be your boyfriend. And Hakyeon will, too, I know he will. He loves you. We both love you so much.” He sets the drawing aside carefully, muttering something about putting it in a book where it belongs, and climbs back into bed with Sanghyuk, encircling the boy in his arms and pulling him into a long kiss.

Sanghyuk has never been happier than this, cannot imagine being so full to the brim with joy as he is in this moment. And when he kisses Jaehwan, he tastes like sleep and sunshine, and something new -- love.

\---

Sanghyuk moves in about a month after he graduates. Officially moves in, anyhow; he’s basically been living there since the whole confession thing, wrapped up in Hakyeon’s and Jaehwan’s embrace, spending every breakfast with them, accompanying Jaehwan to the library or going to pick Hakyeon up after practice because he’s too tired to even make it to the train. He falls more in love every single day.

He’s starting university soon, and Hakyeon, being the eternally doting pseudo-parent that he is, helps Sanghyuk with choosing his classes, doesn’t lecture him about choosing a major too soon. Jaehwan, who has been extra-busy with ‘deadlines’ all summer, tells him his experiences with attending that university, makes Sanghyuk laugh with every embarrassing situation that Jaehwan has ever charmed himself out of.

(Sanghyuk cards his fingers through Jaehwan’s perpetually messy hair. “You could charm your way out of anything,” he says, smiling softly.

“Only with you and Hakyeon,” Jaehwan scoffs in return.)

They have plans on getting a bigger apartment sometime in the middle of Sanghyuk’s first year, are tired of dealing with the neighbours (well, Jaehwan is, they keep odder hours than he does, and he can’t exactly duck out of the apartment and find a quiet place to draw in the middle of the night). Sanghyuk has made friends with the boy next door, the one with the dimples; his name’s Hongbin, and Hongbin makes Sanghyuk promise that he’ll come hang out sometime soon, so he does, and happily at that.

The three of them fit together perfectly. 

In September, Jaehwan gives Sanghyuk the gift of a brand new serial that just came out a few days before, one that’s kind of underground and not on a lot of shelves yet. “How did you get this…?” he asks, brows raised. He’d wanted to read it, had read a lot about it -- manhwa artists coming up with their own stories for little one-shots, something to do in the dead space between working on one project or another, something of a love letter to their fans.

“Just read it,” Jaehwan urges, smiling like he knows something. Sanghyuk casts a look at Hakyeon, who is playing with his phone and apparently always knows when he’s being looked at, because he, too, grins secretively, and waves Sanghyuk off in agreement with Jaehwan.

So Sanghyuk flips through the stories several times, trying to pick out what Jaehwan’s intention might have been, when…

An opening to a short story. A superhero in a school uniform.

The drawing Jaehwan had made of Sanghyuk, when all this had really Gotten Started.

Sanghyuk nearly cries, carries the book to Jaehwan (who is seated very comfortably in Hakyeon’s lap with the elder’s arms around him) and thrusts it into his face; Jaehwan and Hakyeon laugh in unison. “You did this? You’re Park Kitae?”

“That’s me,” Jaehwan says, and pulls Sanghyuk down by the wrists so quickly that the boy drops the book beside the pile of boyfriends in favour of being made into a human sandwich, but upright. “You really didn’t know?”

“I had no idea…” Sanghyuk whispers, smiling and burying his face in Jaehwan’s neck, reaching round him to hold both Hakyeon’s hands. “I love you so, so much.”

“I love you,” says Jaehwan, kissing Sanghyuk’s cheek.

“I love you,” echoes Hakyeon, scooting up to kiss Sanghyuk’s head.

And they stay like this for hours, comfortable, content.


End file.
